


The Girl with the Serpent's Tongue

by v0rtexFM



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Reincarnation, Family Dynamics, Graphic Depictions of Illness, Harry Potter is Rescued, Magically Powerful Character, Multi, OC as Canon Character, OC as Ginny Weasley, Parseltongue, Recreational Drug Use
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-04-09
Updated: 2018-04-09
Packaged: 2019-04-20 19:34:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,140
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14268060
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/v0rtexFM/pseuds/v0rtexFM
Summary: Hazel McIntyre is dreaming of Harry Potter.She is down in the Chamber of Secrets, tripping over the body of the slain basilisk, stumbling to maneuver Ginny Weasley's too-short limbs, and hissing melodiously for all to hear. She is in awe, struck dumb, elated that her mind could come up with scenery so magical, so beautiful. She has hair the colour of sunsets and skin dotted with constellations of freckles, worn school robes and a wand clutched in her clammy hand, and Hogwarts is everything and nothing like her most desperate fantasies.Hazel McIntyre is overwhelmed with magic and joy, she struggles to take it all in before she wakes.Hazel McIntyre's body cools in a cramped apartment bathroom. Hazel McIntyre is not dreaming.





	The Girl with the Serpent's Tongue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Anything you recognize probably came verbatim from "Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets". I do not own this, I'm just borrowing some sentences to set the scene. 
> 
> " ** _This is Parseltongue._** "

There was a long, dreadful, piercing scream. Ink spurted out of the diary in torrents, streaming over Harry’s hands, flooding the floor. Riddle was writhing and twisting, screaming and flailing, and then –

He had gone. Harry’s wand fell to the floor with a clatter and there was silence. Silence except for the steady _drip drip_ of ink still oozing from the diary. The basilisk venom had burned a sizzling hole right through it.

Shaking all over, Harry pulled himself up. His head was spinning as if he’d just travelled miles by floo powder. Slowly, he gathered together his wand and the Sorting Hat, and, with a huge tug, retrieved the glittering sword from the roof of the basilisk’s mouth.

Then came a faint moan from the end of the Chamber. Ginny was stirring. As Harry hurried towards her, she sat up. Her bleary eyes jerked from the huge form of the dead basilisk, over Harry, in his blood-soaked robes, then to the diary in his hand. She gaped a moment, her mouth opening and closing like a fish struggling for air, then her hand came up and dragged over her face.

“ _ **What the fuck**_ **?** ”

Harry was the one who looked like a fish, then. His eyes boggled, not used to hearing anyone talk like that, let along the younger sister of his best friend.

Ginny stuck her thumbnail in her mouth and chewed at it, her head going from one side to the other as she took in the enormity of the Chamber. Then she looked down at herself, at her grimy black robes and scraped hands, and when her hair fell in front of her face she reared back like she had been struck.

“ _ **Alright, okay, dreaming – I can deal with that**_ **,** ” she said wearily.

That’s when Harry noticed it. Not the odd twist to Ginny’s lips, nor the awkward way she was holding her arms, but the sibilant hissing undertone carried along with her voice. After listening to Riddle rant and rave at him, at the basilisk, Harry recognized what it was, what that hissing meant.

Ginny was speaking Parseltongue.

 

* * *

 

She was at a party, a New Years Eve party, and the TV was tuned in to the Ball Drop in Times Square. The clock a the corner of the screen read 11:54. In five minutes the countdown would begin and everyone else would fill up the living room to watch, but until then she was content to sprawl over the couch with an arm over her eyes.

Music permeated the air in the apartment, drowning out the voice of the news anchor and thrumming awkwardly in her bones; she didn’t know how there hadn’t been a noise complaint yet, but it wasn’t her party so she didn’t rightly care all that much. Someone opened the sliding glass door that led to the balcony and slid inside, laughter ringing loudly on their lips.

“-and they were roommates!” It was Quinn, she could recognize the other girl’s husky voice easily. “So I told ‘em they had to chill the fuck out, you know?”

Someone hummed in agreement, whoever Quinn was talking to – she didn’t know, she couldn’t differentiate hums. Footsteps came over alongside the couch and stopped, the chatter fading out, “Is she awake?” Oh, the other person was Jules.

She groaned, an exaggerated sound, uncovered her face, and said, “Yeah, she’s awake.”

Quinn grinned. “You better get up, Hazel, people are gonna wanna sit there soon.” She sucked one of her snakebites into her mouth.

“How’s it no one’s pushed you over already?” Jules asked.

“Sheer, dumb luck,” Hazel said.

He kicked the couch, lightly. “Well, nap time is over. Can’t believe you’re snoozin’ at _my_ party.”

“Sorry, sorry,” she said as she sat up slowly. “I’m up now, okay?”

Jules grinned. “I guess.”

Quinn nudged him with her hip. “Cut her some slack, she’s been picking up after people all night.”

“Really?”

“Didn’t you hear that crash like, an hour ago?” She asked. “Evan dropped his bong in the kitchen and everyone was freaking out until Mr Clean over here swept it up.”

“I didn’t know we even had a broom.”

The girl on the couch sighed, “I used a paper towel.”

Jules frowned. “Did you cut yourself?”

“Nah, I was careful enough.”

Quinn snorted, “You’re the only drunk person I’d trust with broken glass.”

“Yeah, you know me,” Hazel drawled. “It takes a lot to fuck this bitch up.”

Jules’ brows still had that little crease between them. “Yeah, well, be careful. I don’t want anyone dropping dead of alcohol poisoning on my floor.”

“I’ll be good, Dad, Scout’s honour.” She held up three fingers with a sharp smirk.

He stuck out his tongue. “Liar, you weren’t a Scout.”

“You got me there.”

Quinn eyed the TV – 11:58. “I’m gonna see if there are any pot brownies left, want me to snag you any?” She looked between her two friends, one standing and one sitting.

“I’ll just come with you,” Jules said.

Hazel shook her head. “I’m good, I already had two.”

“Two? You had two?” Quinn was floored, “You’re only supposed to have half!”

She shrugged and managed to look a little contrite. “I waited twenty minutes like it told me but I never felt anything, so I had more.”

Quinn’s eyebrows were almost at her hairline. “Do you feel anything now?”

Hazel wiggled her hand in a so-so motion.

“Jesus, I should’ve seen that coming. Okay, c’mon Jules, we have like thirty seconds til the countdown starts.”

He rolled his eyes. “I’m coming, I’m coming.”

Hazel watched her two friends – acquaintances – walk through the dining area and pass out of sight into the kitchen. She wasn’t lying, her tolerance was extremely high, but she’d had enough to drink along with those brownies that her vision was starting to warp around the edges. Her head felt heavy and her mouth felt a little numb, but everything else was fine; she wasn’t nauseated, she didn’t feel like her inhibitions had flown the coop, and she was hardly dizzy.

Just as Goldie rushed into the room and scrambled to turn the volume on the TV up for the Ball Drop, Hazel stood up. Like she predicted, everyone was beginning to group up on and around the couch and it was getting too crowded for her liking. Grabbing an unopened can of coke from the coffee table, her empty cup, and her fifth of Smirnoff, she headed out to the balcony.

Sliding the door shut behind her, Hazel noticed she wasn’t the only one who decided some fresh air might be in order. ‘Fresh air’ being a relative term, seeing as the guy was bent over his bong, puffing away. He looked up and held it out to her with a nod, but she shook her head. He shrugged.

“The countdown’s started,” she told him, hoping it would get him to go away and leave her to have some alone time.

It worked. He – Hazel was pretty sure his name was Anish – thanked her and rushed back inside just as the party started counting backwards from twenty.

She didn’t even turn around to look in through the glass. New Years was okay, it was an excuse to go out and drink, but in the end it was just another day; it didn’t really mean anything special. Hazel sat down cross-legged on the concrete and stared out over the surrounding apartment buildings. It was cold enough her breath clouded out of her mouth like smoke, but not so bad she regretted leaving her coat hung up inside.

With steady hands she poured some coke out into her plastic cup, then she examined her vodka. The bottle was nearly half empty. She paused, she hadn’t thought she’d had that much. Did someone steal some when she wasn’t looking?

Whatever. Slow fingers fumbled for a moment with the cap before getting traction and she filled the cup the rest of the way with spirit. Hazel sipped her drink, repressing a gag when the alcohol burned in the back of her throat; too much booze, not enough soda. There was a chorus of cheering and clapping from inside, and out over the city fireworks shot up and exploded in starbursts of technicolour.

She stayed out on the balcony for a good half hour, waiting until the noise coming from inside had died down and her bottle was more than three quarters empty. When she stood up to finally head back into the apartment, she swayed. Hmm, at least she was feeling it now. Hazel picked up her cup, can, and vodka, then awkwardly manoeuvred through the door, using her foot to gently close it once she was inside.

Most of the lamps were turned off, and it took a moment for her eyes to adjust. The coffee table and couch were pushed over against the wall and the floor was covered in comforters and sleeping bags, some of which already had sleepy people wrapped up in them. Hazel was careful to avoid stepping on anyone’s appendages as she tip-toed across the living room towards the light of the kitchen. It was slow going – she could feel herself weaving, and she almost fell over twice.

Jules was at the counter, stacking plastic cups and paper plates before shoving the detritus into the black garbage bag he held open on the floor. There were crumpled up chip bags and bottles of pop overturned on the kitchen table and the tile near the doorway was sticky when she stood on it; in short, it was a mess.

“Do you... wanany help cleanin’?” Hazel asked.

Jules jumped. “Fuck, you startled me.”

“Sh- shorry.”

He stopped what he was doing and narrowed his eyes. “Are you slurring?”

She shrugged and, with the change in position, stumbled into the fridge with a _bang_. “Maybe a lil,” she said, holding a wavering hand up with two fingers barely touching.

“Ooookay.” Jules reached over and took the vodka from her hand. “You’ve had enough.” He actually looked at the bottle, then, “Jesus Christ, Haze, did you drink all this by yourself?”

Hazel nodded, then clutched her head when the room began to spin. Oh, there was the nausea, churning her stomach and climbing up into her mouth. She had definitely had too much to drink, too many pot brownies.

A look of concern passed over Jules’ face. “Shit, Hazel, that’s really not good. Like, that’s actually really, really bad.” He put the bottle in the sink and went back over to her side, one hand moving to rub her back. “Do you need to go to the washroom?”

Hazel nodded again, slower this time, and set her can and cup on the counter where they promptly fell over. Jules tried to take her arm and help her along, but she waved him off and used the edge of the counter for balance instead, sliding her way across the linoleum tiles like a newborn deer whose legs weren’t working yet.

Down the short hallway, first door on the left; Hazel pushed it open and stared, uncomprehending, at the bedroom she was faced with. Someone was curled up fast asleep in the bed, covers thrown haphazardly over them, and there were two others snoring on the floor wrapped up in a sleeping bag. She gingerly closed the door and tried the _second_ on the left.

Perfect, bathroom.

Tripping over her own feet after closing the door, Hazel nearly careened face first into the shower curtain before she was able to right herself and inch down the wall to kneel in front of the toilet. Lid up, hair brushed back, she rested her elbows on the seat and bent over the bowl. Even with her eyes closed her vision was swimming – God, how had it hit her so fast? Everything smelled like toilet water and lemon cleaner, and no matter how ill she felt her gag reflex wasn’t cooperating. If she just threw up she’d feel a hell of a lot better, yet she strained, and coughed, and spat, and nothing came up.

A light knock came at the door. “Haze, are you okay?” Jules asked.

“Yeah,” she forced her voice to be still and strong, and she enunciated as clearly as she could, no need to make him worry any more. “Yeah, I’ll... be ok – ay, I’m just gonna be in here... a little while.”

“If you’re sure...”

Hazel nodded over the toilet absentmindedly, forgetting he couldn’t see. “I’m sure, Jules, go... to be – d.”

“Okay,” he said. “Feel better, yeah?”

She listened as his footsteps carried back down the hall until she couldn’t hear them anymore, and she watched the hall light go off through the crack under the door. Another door opened and shut, presumably the one to Jules’ room, and there was nothing but silence and the _drip drip_ of the toilet tank. Silence, her own breath, silence, a car honked down on the street, silence.

Suddenly saliva pooled in her mouth and her throat was opening up, forcing something out; her eyes were watering, her face felt hot from the force of it, and a sick retching noise crawled past her teeth. She gagged once, twice, and then –

Nothing. Nothing came out.

Hazel’s vision faded out in the periphery, leaving her with only white porcelain in sight. She had a sinking feeling in her chest, now, to combat the sickly swirl of her stomach, and she knew something wasn’t right. One more retch. She tried, honestly she did, but her head ached and she just knew blood vessels were bursting around her eyes, and that one more retch did nothing at all.

Her arms gave out for a second and she barely managed to catch herself before her face slammed into the toilet seat. She pushed herself back, wiped the spit from her mouth with the back of her hand, and fell back against the wall with a dull _thump._ Something was wrong, she felt it in the loose numbness of her limbs, in the black still encroaching on her vision, something was wrong and she should probably get some help. Her body was lagging so far behind her brain it was as if she were paralyzed.

She managed to stagger to her feet using the wall as support and take a single step before her knee buckled under her, sending her back to the floor. Hazel was careful to muffle the sound, to slide against the wall and not slam into anything too loudly – she didn’t want to wake anyone up, it would be rude.

Wait, she wanted help, didn’t she? Maybe she should be making a lot of noise, trying to bring people close.

No, that would just make everyone overreact, there was no way she was actually as bad as she felt; it would be better to just get out of the bathroom, find Jules, and ask him for some salt water to help her puke. Once she threw up everything would be fine.

Hazel wasn’t even able to stand up again, her legs weren’t doing what she wanted them to. She would just crawl, then, she’d crawl to the door, use it to stand again, and she’d make it out into the hall to find Jules. Carefully, quietly, she laid out on her belly and pulled herself half a foot with her hands.

That was it, that was as far as she made it. Before she could draw herself any further her vision completely greyed out. She felt all the blood seep out of her head and pool sluggishly in her chest, her legs no longer seemed attached to her body, and she was exhausted. What was the point? She would throw up eventually, she had to. Hazel blinked the blackness away and pressed her cheek against the cold floor, knowing her head should be pointed to the side so there wasn’t a chance of choking on her own puke.

She would lie there for a minute or two, collect her bearings, then she’d continue on her little trek. Maybe ten minutes, okay, fifteen, but that’s all. She’d rest a while and get on with it after, yeah. Closing her eyes, she let herself slowly drift off, knowing that it would only be for a bit, knowing she’d be better when she woke up.

Hazel McIntyre never did.

 

* * *

 

“Ginny...” Harry said, his voice wavering. “Are you alright?”

“ _ **Oh yes**_ **,** ” she said simply, standing and brushing the dust from her robes. “ _ **I’m just adjusting a bit, that’s all**_ **.** ”

“ _ **Ad**_ -adjusting?” He struggled to keep from slipping into Parseltongue himself.

Ginny blinked. “ _ **You’re sure curious for a dream-boy**_ **.** ”

Harry’s cheeks went rosy with blush. “A dream-boy? I – I’m not-”

“ _ **You know, a dream person, a dream guy, a dream**_ **,** ” she said, and walked over to stand directly in front of him. “ _ **Oh I’m short, that sucks**_ **.** ”

“What – what are you talking about?”

Her eyes narrowed skeptically and she shook her head, then craned her neck to look at the ceiling. “ _ **You know, this place is a lot bigger than I imagined, bigger than they even showed in the movie.**_ ”

Harry was lost. He had absolutely no idea what Ginny was going on about, so he latched onto her earlier statement, the one about dreaming. “Why do you think you’re dreaming?”

“ _ **Because I’m Ginny, apparently,**_ ” she deadpanned. “ _ **Because I’m in the Chamber of Secrets, because you’re Harry Potter, because I’m ginger – take your pick, dude, there’s a billion reasons**_ **.** ”

He didn’t know what to say to that.

“ _ **We might as well head up**_ **,** ” she said. Not even bothering to look back at him, Ginny stepped around the motionless coils of the basilisk and headed towards where Fawkes was hovering above the Chamber entrance.

Harry hurried after her, sword scraping against the damp stone as he fought to keep it aloft. There was something wrong, something off, about Ginny Weasley, something other than her sudden Parseltongue ability. She held herself higher yet tripped over her feet, like she was trying to take longer steps than her short legs would allow.

When they were almost out past the enormous doors, Fawkes let out a haunting trill. Harry didn’t feel his heart swell this time, but the spine-tingling chill crawled along his shoulders all the same; there was something mournful about this cry. Ginny’s head snapped up and her eyes went wide as saucers as she stared up at the phoenix, her mouth dropping open in awe.

“ _ **Holy shit,**_ ” she breathed. “ _ **That’s Fawkes, you’re Fawkes...**_ ”

Fawkes crooned and swooped down to look Ginny in the face a moment, then circled her and flew deeper out into the tunnel. He hovered there, just before the bend, apparently waiting for them to catch up. Ginny closed her mouth with a _click_ but kept staring.

“Uh, Ginny?” Harry asked.

She shook her head roughly before turning to him. “ _ **Yeah**_ **?** ”

“You – um – you’re not -” he stuttered. “What I’m trying to say is you’re not, really, speaking English...”

“ _ **What**_ **?** ”

She was looking at him with such a nonplussed expression, Harry felt as if he were being studied under a microscope. With a growing sheepishness, he said, “You’re speaking Parseltongue.”

Ginny blinked, once, twice, and a giddy grin spread itself across her face. “ _ **Awesome, that’s just – ah! I’ve always dreamed of being a Parselmouth – heh heh, dreamed. Guess that means literally now, too**_ **.** ”

“You’re not – you’re not worried?” He was so confused. She’d just been taken over – possessed – by Voldemort of all people, and she was excited about being a Parselmouth? Ron was the one who said it was a Dark trait! Shouldn’t the rest of the Weasleys think so too?

“ _ **Nah,**_ ” Ginny laughed and started walking again. “ _ **C’mon, dude, it’s so cool. Talking to snakes? That’s like, the best magic ever – snakes are adorable.**_ ”

“Nobody else will understand, though,” he said, falling into step with her. “Do you know how to switch back?”

She made a thoughtful-sounding hum. “ _ **Sounds like English to me, honestly. How do you do it? Switch back and forth, I mean? Doesn’t it sound like English to you, too?**_ ”

Harry didn’t remember ever mentioning that to anyone except Ron and Hermione, so how did Ginny know? “I – uh – I couldn’t tell, at first, but after a bit I noticed a hissing noise when I talked – sort of faint, in the background. I have to look at a snake to speak it, though, I don’t really have a problem stopping.”

Another hum. “ _ **Lemme try something,**_ ” she said. Then she began to make a series of long S noises, nonsense hisses, stretching out the syllables and stressing different parts of the sounds. “ _ **SssssssssSSSSss – ah – sss – AHSsss – ssSsSSS. Okay I think – hmmm – I think**_ I can – there we go!”

The last words were spoken, he thought, in English, but that didn’t make what she did any less weird. “What was that?” Harry asked.

“I was _ **ssss trying**_ – trying to hear the hissing,” she said, having to double back when she slipped into Parseltongue halfway through. “Then I jus _ **ssst focused**_ _–_ just focused really hard on Englis _ **ssssh.**_ I’m pretty sure I’ve got it, though.”

Harry nodded. “Good, because I think it would freak Ron out.”

Ginny clapped her hands. “Right! A brother! Many brothers; Ginny has those.”

“Did you forget!?” Harry asked, scared to hear the answer.

“ _ **Not**_ – not really. It only _**sssslipped**_ – slipped my mind for a _**ssss**_ second.”

He wasn’t going to drop it that easily, not again. “And why do you keep talking like you’re not Ginny, in the third person like that?” A dark thought crept into his mind, then. What if Riddle wasn’t gone? What if it was all a trick and he was still possessing her? What if that whole scene with the diary and him writhing and disintegrating into smoke was some illusion magic Harry had never heard of? Quickly he shifted the things in his arms and pointed his wand at Ginny. How could he have been so stupid? The Parseltongue made it so obvious!

Riddle-as-Ginny stopped and looked down at his wand with confusion. “Why’re you pointing that at me?”

His arm shook, he had escaped death not ten minutes ago and he didn’t want to face another of Riddle’s attacks, but he would if he had to. “Get out of Ginny,” Harry ordered.

“Oh this dream is getting boring,” she muttered, still loud enough for him to hear. Then she rolled her eyes and gently pushed his wand away from where it had been pointed at her chest. “Hey, _**listen, I’m not Voldemort or anything, so you can put that away**_ **.** ”

“Then why are you suddenly a Parselmouth?” He asked, voice wavering. She’d been hissing again. “Why are you acting so different?”

“Dude, it’s a dream!” She cried exasperatedly, “Why is anything, anything in a dream? It just is! Let’s keep on going where we’re going and soon I’ll wake up and my subconscious will stop giving me the third degree, alright?”

Harry faltered. Riddle-as-Ginny, no, Ginny? Ginny seemed just as confused as he was. Was this some sort of side effect from the diary? Her not remembering things? Her personality change? Her Parseltongue? He awkwardly shoved his wand into his robe pocket. “You’re not asleep, Ginny.”

“Sounds like something a dream-boy would say,” she shot back.

The term still made him blush, but he was starting to understand. This was probably how Ginny acted when he wasn’t around, when she wasn’t being all shy because he was The-Boy-Who-Lived, and since she thought she was dreaming she wasn’t self-conscious. At least, that was his theory. They had to see Dumbledore, he’d know how to fix everything.

“Wait a minute,” Ginny pointed to the patched-up cloth in his hand. “That’s the Sorting Hat.”

“Um, yes?”

Her eyes lit up. “You think it would Sort me? Y’know, even though it’s not September first?”

Harry’s heart was sinking, she couldn’t remember her Sorting? “Ginny, you’ve been Sorted already...”

“Oh, right,” she pouted. “Ginny’s a Gryffindor.”

From down the tunnel he heard Fawkes cry, and somehow he knew the bird was telling them to hurry up. Ginny seemed to know so, too. “We’re coming!” She yelled. “For an immortal creature you sure are impatient!”

Another cry – this one sounded a little indignant, actually – and Fawkes flew back around the corner to fix Ginny with a look.

As Harry and Ginny got closer to the last bend, Harry could hear the _skriff_ of shifting rocks and he ran the rest of the way. As he rounded the bend he could see the cave-in and, through a hole in the debris big enough for someone his size, Ron’s face peering eagerly back at him.

“I swear, I just heard her voice!” Ron was readying to pull himself through the opening, “Is she okay? Tell me she’s okay!”

“She’s okay,” Harry said, but he wasn’t sure he was telling the truth.

Ginny came into view, then, and Fawkes swooped low over her head. “I’m sorry, okay?” She was saying, watching the phoenix circle the air above them. “You’re a regal and majestic dream-animal, I’m sorry I yelled at you.”

“Ginny!” Ron cried, reaching through the hole and motioning for her with his hands. “Come on, come on, I’ll help you over.”

She let herself be pulled past the blockage and into the other end of the tunnel, Fawkes flying through after her. She didn’t even look back before continuing on towards the pipe; Ron didn’t seem to notice, but Harry did.

“What – where did this bird come from?” Ron asked.

Harry squeezed himself past the opening and said, “He’s Dumbledore’s.”

“How come you’ve got a sword!?”

“It came out of the Sorting Hat.”

Ron was baffled. “Why do you have the Sorting Hat?”

Harry was anxious to catch up with Ginny; he didn’t want her getting more confused or acting even weirder, maybe even getting hurt because she was by herself. “I’ll explain later,” he said. “We should go after Ginny.”

“What d’you mean? She’s right – hey!” Ron spun around, searching for his sister. “Oi, Ginny! Ginny? Where are you?”

“She went up to the pipe, Ron, she can’t have gone far. Where’s Lockhart?”

The red-headed boy was already walking. “Back there. He’s in a bad way, I don’t want him alone with Ginny too long.”

“Is he dangerous?” Harry asked.

“His memory’s gone,” Ron explained, hurrying now. “The Memory Charm backfired. Hit him instead of us. Hasn’t got a clue who he is, or where he is, or who we are. I told him to go wait. I don’t know what he could do.”

As the two boys approached the end of the tunnel, their way illuminated by Fawkes’ soft golden glow, they saw Ginny standing next to a sitting Lockhart, examining him with a curious face. The man was humming quietly to himself, swaying side-to-side in place, looking up at Ginny guilelessly.

“Took you guys long enough,” she said with her hands on her hips. “Fraud-hart over here isn’t much of a conversationalist.”

“Fraud-hart?” Ron whispered to Harry, confused.

He shrugged.

Ginny must have heard, because she explained, “It’s ‘cause he’s a fraud, Ron, duh.”

Ron spluttered, “How do you know that? You weren’t here!”

“Oops,” she deadpanned. “Didn’t know my dream was so continuity-conscious.”

“Ginny, you’re not dreaming!” Harry yelled desperately.

Lockhart fixed him with a good-natured look. “She hisses, did you know?”

That’s when Harry noticed the pipe – more accurately, he noticed what was different about the pipe. Winding across the inside was a set of stairs leading all the way back up to the sink in the girls’ bathroom, a set of stairs that certainly hadn’t been there on the way down. Where had those come from? Why was Ginny speaking Parseltongue in front of Lockhart?

Ron was even more confused than before. “What do you mean she hisses?”

“She just did,” Lockhart said plainly. “She hissed and those stairs appeared in the pipe. It was all very magical.”

Ginny didn’t seem too bothered. She looked pleased with herself, if he were being honest. “It works in all the fanfiction, so I thought, hey, no harm in trying. And what do you know, stairs!”

“Can we go back to the part where my sister was hissing?” Ron asked, “I feel like I’m missing something important, here!”

Harry, meanwhile, was trying to figure out what ‘fanfiction’ was. He didn’t have a clue.

“I’m a Parselmouth, apparently,” Ginny said flippantly, not even bothering to watch her brother’s reaction before asking Lockhart. “You remember how to walk, right?”

He nodded. “Oh yes!”

“Good, makes everything easier. Okay people – and proud, majestic bird – let’s get a move on!” She exclaimed with a thrust of her hand in the air before climbing the first step. “I wanna see some Hogwarts before I wake up!”

As Ginny led Lockhart up the pipe, all the colour had drained from Ron’s face and he was gripping at Harry’s robes with white-knuckled force. “What does she mean she’s a Parselmouth?” He asked, though it ended in a bit of a wail. “And what does she mean ‘wake up’? Harry, what is she talking about? What happened down there?”

“She thinks she’s dreaming,” Harry explained quietly, trying to usher Ron towards the pipe and up the stairs. “I don’t know why, she just does. I’ll explain the rest later, I promise, she’s just a little confused right now.”

“So she’s not a Parselmouth,” Ron said, relieved.

Harry sighed, “Well, no, she is...”

Fawkes chirruped, then, and soared up the pipe past them, and Harry moved more quickly on the steps, dragging Ron behind. Ron was talking, but more to himself than to Harry, saying things like “How is my own sister a Parselmouth? She hates snakes. The Twins showed her one, tried to make her hold it – she started crying! I don’t get it. How did no one know?” and so-on and so-forth. When the two of them finally emerged from the sink into Moaning Myrtle’s bathroom, Ginny, Lockhart, and Fawkes were all waiting for them a few feet away. The sink stayed open behind them.

“Huh,” Ginny said. “I thought it closed on its own.”

Myrtle just goggled at them, “You’re alive.”

“There’s no need to sound so disappointed,” Harry shot back.

Ginny had walked back over to the sink and was examining it with the same intensity she’d examined Lockhart minutes earlier.

“Oh, well...” Myrtle demurred. “I’d been thinking... if you had died, you could’ve shared my toilet.”

“I could’ve sworn it closed,” Harry heard Ginny say from behind him. “We can’t just leave it open like this, someone could fall in! Wait... listen to me... a dream-person could fall into the dream-hole in the dream-sink, right.”

“Ginny, get away from there!” Ron yelped.

She scoffed, “Hush. Lemme try something.” Her jaw seemed to relax, then, and when she opened her mouth a second later Parseltongue came flowing out. “ _ **Close**_ **,** ” she hissed.

The sink moved silently back into place, erasing all signs of the passage and the Chamber below. Ron was gaping, Lockhart stood placidly by his side, and Harry took a moment to wipe the crusting blood off of his glasses.

Moaning Myrtle, on the other hand, wailed, “Oh it’s that awful noise!” With a sob, she shot towards the ceiling and dive-bombed into one of the closed stalls with a wet _gurgle._

“So,” Ginny brushed her hands together theatrically. “That’s that, I suppose. Where do we go from here?”

Fawkes cooed from above and soared out into the corridor. The four of them followed; Ron, stuttering, trying to get out his words; Lockhart with a smile, humming his way along; Harry, still juggling the Hat, the sword, and the diary, trying not to drop any of them; Ginny, leading the way with a little hop in her step.

“ _ **This is amazing,**_ ” Ginny breathed, darting back-and-forth across the hall to examine all the portraits, scuffing her feet along the stone floor, tilting her head back to stare up at the high ceiling. “ _ **Damn, my imagination is good.**_ ”

Ron flinched.

Before Harry could correct her and tell her she wasn’t dreaming for the third time, or mention that she’d once again slipped into Parseltongue, Fawkes stopped in front of the door to Professor McGonagall’s office. He hovered there, expectantly.

Ginny raised her hand to knock, then seemed to think better of it and stepped back. “You better do it,” she said to Harry, gesturing to... all of him. “You have the sword and the book and the Hat, it’ll be way cooler if you walk in first.”

He hung his head for a moment, lamenting Ginny’s ridiculous new attitude, before knocking on the solid oak and pushing it open.

 

* * *

 

Giuliano Marino – call him Jules or else – could taste something dead in his mouth. Okay, perhaps not actually, but his tongue was dry and his teeth were tacky and the back of his throat felt all stale. That’s what he got for going to bed without brushing his teeth, or gargling, or even taking a drink of water. Cheetos and rum weren’t that delicious four hours after he’d eaten them.

As quietly as he was able, he inched his bedroom door open and stole into the hallway. God, did he need to piss. He wasn’t looking forward to cleaning the rest of his apartment in the morning – it had been a mistake to invite more than ten people to his apartment and he wouldn’t be repeating the experience unless someone paid him.

Tugging his hand through his hair, Jules reached the bathroom and frowned. The light was on, shining through the crack at the top of the door. Shit, someone was in there? He only had one bathroom, dammit, and he had to go! “Hello?” He whispered, and knocked twice. “Anyone in there?”

No answer. Not even a shuffle of feet or a rustle of a belt, just silence.

“Okay, I’m coming in.”

The hinges creaked as the door swung slowly inward; Jules was about to mutter some complaint about ungrateful guests wasting electricity when the door _thunk_ -ed against something and didn’t open any further. Great, it had to be caught on the bathmat or something.

“Fucking, fuck.” Bringing the door back, he swung it out again it hopes of dislodging whatever it was. _Thunk._ He grumbled and did it again, twice. _Thunk, thunk._ There was a bit of give, but not enough, so Jules squeezed through the space he’d managed to make and was winding up to kick the bathmat out of the way when he froze.

It wasn’t the bathmat.

“Oh fuck, _oh fuck_!” No, this couldn’t be happening. “Haze? Hazel!?”

His friend was lying prone, cheek mushed against the floor, neck and shoulders at an odd angle from where the door had pushed into her. Her hair was spread out like a dark halo, her clothes were rumpled, but the most horrifying thing? Her eyes; they were half open, showing only the whites, like they’d rolled into the back of her head.

“Hazel, wake up!” He sank to his knees and snapped in her ears, put both hands on her back and shook her. She didn’t stir, didn’t moan or grumble or twitch. “Hazel!” He yelled, and shook her again.

She just slumped back into position, like a rag doll. Why wasn’t she moving? Why wasn’t she waking up? Jules felt cold all over as he scrambled for her wrist, pressed two fingers against the vein, felt nothing but an uncanny chill on her skin. “C’mon, c’mon Haze don’t do this to me!” His hands shook as he put those same two fingers on her neck and prayed for warmth, for the comforting _thud-thud_ of a heartbeat. Nothing. How could there be nothing?

Fuck, she was so pale. Why was she so pale? Shit, shit, were her lips blue? Oh god, they were. Jules could see blue shadows under her eyes and around her mouth, like the blood was draining out of her face or coagulating or stopped altogether. CPR, he had to give her CPR, right? He hadn’t done first aid in years. He was gonna fuck it up – he was gonna kill her!

Tears clouded his vision and spilled over his cheeks, his breath was coming in shaky gasps, and he could feel himself trembling harder with each passing second. With hard motions Jules flipped her over onto her back, tried to not focus on how heavy and unyielding she was, tried not to think the words ‘dead-weight’, and pressed his ear to her chest – one last, desperate plea for a sign.

Silence.

A sob ripped out of him, a wet, thick sound that gurgled in his mouth. “Somebody!” He screamed out the open door. “Somebody help!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Posting this to get it off my chest, seeing as I have many WIPs and I crave validation. Criticism is welcomed with open arms, even if it makes me cry.


End file.
